{"id":652,"date":"2013-08-09T21:50:11","date_gmt":"2013-08-10T01:50:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maureensmusings.ca\/?p=652"},"modified":"2015-03-15T21:27:57","modified_gmt":"2015-03-16T01:27:57","slug":"royal-botanical-gardens-august-9-2013","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maureensmusings.ca\/?p=652","title":{"rendered":"Royal Botanical Gardens – August 9, 2013"},"content":{"rendered":"

Steve and I were supposed to leave together on Wednesday, July 31st – a road trip to Sioux Lookout to visit with our daughter, Yelena, for a week.\u00a0 Unfortunately, events at work prevented me from taking all that time off, so Steve headed out on his own.<\/p>\n

I did end up with a 5-day weekend, starting yesterday, and I\u2019m busy keeping myself busy.<\/p>\n

This morning, I took myself off to the Royal Botanical Gardens <\/a>in Burlington, a place we\u2019ve known about since we moved here 30 years ago! but had not \u201cfound the time\u201d to check out.<\/p>\n

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RBG, as it\u2019s known, is a Canadian National Historic Site and has properties spread out over 6 locations, 3 sanctuaries, and 1 tract – all over 2,400 acres.\u00a0 Along its combined 27km hiking trails, there are more than 50 at-risk species and many stop-over points for thousands of migratory birds.\u00a0 It\u2019s open year round and there are many events throughout the year.<\/p>\n

I started at the beginning, the RBG Centre, quite a large \u201cgreen\u201d building with interesting architectural features, that houses function rooms, a full service restaurant, a shop, the admin offices and a lovely Mediterranean garden.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t stay in that garden too long because it\u2019s a huge hot house and the sun was baking me.\u00a0 I think that would be more ideal for a cooler day.<\/p>\n

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The access to Hendrie Park, where most of the gardens and public events are, is accessed through the main centre by way of a tunnel underneath Plains Road, a main thoroughfare in Burlington.\u00a0 On my way to the tunnel, I stopped to watch some staff prepare the atrium for an event later that night.<\/p>\n

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The eye candy started immediately upon exiting the tunnel and I didn\u2019t know which way to go, where to look, and what to take pictures of.\u00a0 Of course, I figured it out (I had a map and, if you know me well, not only do I love maps but I’m pretty adept with them, too) and spent the next couple of hours wandering, admiring, and capturing.<\/p>\n

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I even made a couple of new friends…<\/p>\n

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By noon I was hot, sweaty, and tired.\u00a0 It\u2019s difficult for me to resist a Tea House, so I didn\u2019t!\u00a0 The terrace is in the shade, so that\u2019s where I had lunch.<\/p>\n

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The closest of the next property, Laking Garden, was an hour walk.\u00a0 I chose to drive over so I\u2019d have enough time to visit all of the properties, if only to get a sense of what was where (at least, that was the plan).<\/p>\n

I did end up spending about an hour strolling around Laking Gardens, where there is a most impressive formal hedge and tree sculptured area.\u00a0 There is also lots of ornamental grasses, which I am attracted to.<\/p>\n

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On my way to Laking Gardens, I passed a lake area that looked interesting but, on my way back, there was no room left in the parking lot so I\u2019ll have to bring Steve back another time.<\/p>\n

The next property is the Rock Garden, considered by many to be the heart and soul of RBG (according to their literature).\u00a0 I\u2019ll have to wait 2 years to find out for myself.\u00a0 After 80 years, it\u2019s undergoing a major facelift and is closed to the public.<\/p>\n

At this point, I had a decision to make.\u00a0 I could drive 3km to the Arboretum, where there is an interpretive centre, or drive 7km in the opposite direction to the Fishway, an integral part of a nature sanctuary.\u00a0 As I was getting tired, I chose the Arboretum, which was also on my way home.\u00a0 I\u00a0stayed in the Interpretive Centre long enough to use the washroom, as that turned out to be the home of the kids\u2019 day camp program.\u00a0 Let\u2019s just say there were lots of little, happy campers there today.<\/p>\n

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But, of particular interest is the return of the Bald Eagles to this preserve.\u00a0 As a result of the use of DDT, these eagles became extinct in most of North America in the mid-20th century.\u00a0 Following the ban of DDT in Canada in 1989, their return has been slow but, after 4 years of failed attempts, a nesting pair finally hatched chicks this spring – the first babies along the shores of Lake Ontario\u00a0in over 50 years!\u00a0 One of the Arboretum hiking trails takes you past a viewing spot, but it would have taken me close to an hour to get there, so I chose to do that another day, with Steve.\u00a0 I did walk 15 minutes down to a marsh though, where I was rewarded with more photo ops.<\/p>\n

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I was done.\u00a0 It was a really hot day and I had been outdoors, walking, for 5 hours (broken up by a half hour break for lunch).\u00a0 I deserved to climb into my air conditioned car and head home.<\/p>\n

I took a wrong turn going up Old Guelph Road and ended up driving through Dundas.\u00a0 I knew where I was then, so took our normal motorcycle route, up the escarpment. Ironically, as I cruised along the back country roads, I came across the Rock Chapel Sanctuary, so now know exactly where to bring Steve\u00a0for a hike there.<\/p>\n

Even though it would have been so much better to have shared today with Steve, I had an excellent day getting some exercise, getting some sun, and getting some excellent photos.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Steve and I were supposed to leave together on Wednesday, July 31st – a road trip to Sioux Lookout to visit with our daughter, Yelena, for a week.\u00a0 Unfortunately, events at work prevented me from taking all that time off, Read More …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26,34,35,33],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-652","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-close-to-home","category-flowers","category-gardens","category-royal-botanical-gardens"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maureensmusings.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/652","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maureensmusings.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maureensmusings.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maureensmusings.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maureensmusings.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=652"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/maureensmusings.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/652\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":724,"href":"https:\/\/maureensmusings.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/652\/revisions\/724"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maureensmusings.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maureensmusings.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=652"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maureensmusings.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}